Immigration newsletter 19 December 2007

The United Kingdom's Immigration and Borders Agency has announced plans to cut the validity period for visit visas from six months to three months. As part of the proposal, families would need to post a cash, £1,000 "visa bond" to ensure relatives leave when their visas expire. Also, use of visit visas for business will cease and instead a new class of visa will be created for that purpose. 

The proposals now go to consultation for public comments until March 10th of next year. The government is expected to issue its final proposals within 90 days after the end of the consultaion preiod. Similar measures had been considered in 2000, but were shelved after protests from immigrant communities.

According to the president of Universities UK, the United Kingdom's new points-based immigration system could make the country less attractive to foreign students. This could result in the loss tens of millions of pounds for UK educational institutions. The new points-based system will require universities to choose students sooner, sponsor them, and have them register with the Home Office. The concern is that "little measures, deep inside" the system risk making it too difficult for students to come to the UK. Potential students might then find opportunities in other countries more attractive for advanced education.

The United Kingdom's Office of National Statistics (ONS) has published a new report showing that 21% of recent births in Britain are babies born to migrant women. The number of children born to mothers originally from Europen Union countries other than the United Kingdom and Ireland increased by 87% between 2001 and 2006. 

The UK population is currently growing at its fastest rate since the 1960s. From mid-2001 to mid-2006, Brtain's population increased by 1.5 million, to just over 60 million people. In 2006, almost 10% of the UK population was born overseas, compared to 6% in 1981. 

The United Kingdom has indefinitely suspended Tier 5 of the new points-based immigration system targeted toward unskilled workers from outside of the European Union. Britain's Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, effectively announced the suspension, along with several other proposals, in a speech at the London School of Economics on December 5th. The new policies are intended to come into force "in 100 days' time." 

The announcement comes as one in a series of new policies being established by the current government as the new points-based, "Tier" system begins to come into effect during March 2008. Tier 5 is designed to deal with unskilled workers from non-EU nations, but Immigration Minister, Liam Byrne, said plans to include unskilled workers in the system have now been "shelved for the foreseeable future."

Wales may be facing a labor shortage in the near future, according to analysis presented to a House of Lords committee by Dr. Heaven Crawley of Swansea University. Survey data from the UK government indicates that most Eastern European migrants intend to return home within five years. Thus, there may well be a labor shortage coming soon as migration levels have been dropping off. Most migrants from Eastern Europe are employed in administration, rather than agriculture, professions. According to Dr. Crawley, a greater proportion of Eastern EU immigrants in Wales go into the public sector.

The Dutch parliament opposes a government proposal to open the Netherlands labor market to nationals of Bulgaria and Romania after 2009, the date set by the previous government for labor restrictions to be lifted. The Dutch Social Affairs and Employment Minister attempted to put the topic on the schedule for discussion. However, all political parties refused to allow the subject to be placed on the agenda. Until the restrictions are lifted, Bulgarian and Romanian citizens must obtain a work permit to take employment in the Netherlands, the same as any other non-EU citizen.

A new study by authors from Aga Khan University and Baqai University in Pakistan shows that a large percentage of students from both medical universities plan to go abroad for their post-graduate education ... and, many countries provide immigration schemes targeted at foreign graduates to encourage them to attend their educational institutions. 

Two of the most common factors cited by students as contributing to their desire to study abroad were poor salaries and poor quality of training in their home country. Other factors included poor working environments and lack of "strict teaching methods" for residents in domestic university hospitals.

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